


protect/serve

by mercredigirl



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Character Study, F/M, mundane_bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-25
Updated: 2010-08-25
Packaged: 2017-10-11 06:14:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/109287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercredigirl/pseuds/mercredigirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Mai had smiled, that tight, say-nothing smile that left no hint, never any hint, of any simmering or raging inside her.</i></p><p>Of mornings after: Zuko and Mai re-evaluate loyalty, fear and dependency.</p>
            </blockquote>





	protect/serve

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [](http://mundane-bingo.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**mundane_bingo**](http://mundane-bingo.dreamwidth.org/) prompt: **Writing implement dies when needed most.**

No doubt there is royal protocol for mornings-after, but a: Zuko never received the memo; and b: he doesn't believe in it, either. Too many maidservants have been dismissed from court because you can't say no to the duke who owns the land your family works and you can't bear a bastard heir.

He tells himself, as he leaves the bed (_listening to her breathe, shallow and gentle, knowing that she, like him, has learnt to slip out of bed and into a defensive pose almost automatically_) that he will never be a king who does such things. When he becomes king. If.

A twinge of guilt (也许 it's his conscience, 也许 the roiling anger of the Blue Spirit) whispers, 'That's what you're doing now.'

_No_, he snaps back. _What I'm doing is protecting her. From my father, from my sister._

'From yourself,' the Spirit sneers in return, and then falls silent.

He makes it to the living room, before he collapses onto the couch from the trembling of his limbs.

Mai keeps her writing material in a drawer under the tea-table, because of all the times they would cluster in her house, back when they were a childhood gang and nothing more. He remembers the summer afternoon

_hot as a dragon's flame, it seemed. He was ten, he thinks, and he'd wanted to go swimming, but 'Let's visit Mai!' Azula had cried, although she stopped for a whirlwind abduction of Ty Lee as well._

It was always the four of them, even then: summers together in one another's palaces, or in the gardens of the Imperial Court, or – on the rarest, most prized of occasions – on the seashore of Ember Island.

They'd sat at this very table, Azula tugging impatiently at Mai and squealing, 'Draw all of us!'

And Mai had smiled, that tight, say-nothing smile that left no hint, never any hint, of any simmering or raging inside her.

'Of course, princess,' she replied coolly – she had been a born diplomat, a beautiful, perfect courtier, even at that age. A survival instinct. Mai had had to learn a lot to survive.

Mai was good at art. She was surprisingly good, because she had been brought up to be a lady, to be a bride. Fit only to be married off and to be useful in her husband's household. So, where Azula had practised bending in furious fits and Ty Lee had vaulted across rooftops giggling madly – where the other girls had had the chance to enjoy themselves, knowing they were spares, the extra princess or the extra daughter in a family with enough children already – Mai had learnt to dance and paint and sing, because her parents had no son, no other child, and if her mother could not bear a son then Mai had better fetch a high bride-price.

So she had picked up the ink-brush, and smoothed a piece of parchment flat over the surface of the table, sketching in broad strokes their childish forms (Zuko scrawny, Azula languid, Ty Lee doing a cartwheel, and Mai, in the corner, as she always was). For the caption

she had written, 'I live but to please, and to serve my nation（尽忠报国 ）。' And her name, tiny, at the end: 梅。

Zuko inhales sharply at the memory. The dedication made Azula happy, of course – she had been drunk on happiness, drunk on the pride of power held and power acknowledged. Elated, bragging: 'You will not forget who is _your_ mistress, Mai.'

'I need to get out of here,' he mutters. Mai's house is not a sanctuary. Not anymore.

He takes a sheet of paper, shakes it out, lifts his brush and dips it into the moistened block of 墨。

'Dear Mai,' he says under his breath, tracing out the characters. 'Oh, fuck.'

The ink must've dried; the marks his brush leaves are faint, translucent. More water would not make the 墨水 runny.

'Dear Mai,' he says, trying again, gritting his teeth, layering his strokes over the original markings.

'Dear Mai, I'm going to – I'm leaving – you'll be safe here – I must find the Avatar – I hate your stationery, you know, Mai. I'm annoyed. I wish you had pencils. I love you. 祝你生活愉快。Zuko. P.S.: You need new ink.'

'Yes,' she says aloud, making him drop the brush in shock and spin around. 'Yes, my lord, I do. Would you be so kind as to run along and buy some for me?'

She is standing in the bedroom door, leaning against the doorframe, that wicked smile (_warm against his ear, whispering in turn both the filthiest of fantasies and the sweetest of endearments, finishing with 'I can take you, Zuko. Without your bending, you'd be pinned against that wall so fast you'd never notice' when he gasped and shuddered against her_) playing still on her pale lips.

'Zuko,' Mai says; and then her brow furrows, and the smile departs. 'Zuko, were you going to leave?'

'I can't.' The look he gives her is anguished. 'I can't stay anymore, Mai. You knew that – everything that's going on – it's not right. It's not what Uncle would have wanted. It's not what Mother would have wanted.'

She raises a sculpted eyebrow, half in amusement, half in wordless comment.

'It's not what I want,' he finishes, desperately, staring at her face (_at the wideness of her forehead, the narrowness of her eyes, the arrogant nobility of her expression_), 'and I cannot bear to stay, but I could not – I couldn't ask you to choose between Azula and me. I couldn't ask you to come with me.'

'Perhaps.' The amusement has gone out of her voice now. The gaze she fixes on him is steady, placid. 'Perhaps. I couldn't ask you to stay, either, I suppose. We neither of us could persuade the other.'

They stand there, for the longest of moments, torn between affection and anxiety.

_Do you love me more_, he asked her once, _or do you fear my sister?_

_I don't hate you_, she told him, as though that was an answer.

'Come with me,' he says again, so quietly it is almost imperceptible.

'I can't,' she says, in a whisper so soft it is like a sigh.

She takes a step backwards, back into her bedroom, drawing the loose thin folds of her red robe over herself, lowering her glance and turning her head away.

He steps over the threshold. 'Mai,' he says, just once.

He does not look back.

The bedroom door closes behind them.


End file.
